Opponents of democracy often raise the spectre of social disorder. Over the long term, it is only democracy and the rule of law that will provide for the long-lasting peaceful rule of the nation.
Egyptian refugees fleeing Libya with the help of the US Air Force.
US Department of Defence
Surely it isn’t too far-fetched to claim that if migrants are to promote democracy back home, it is beneficial for them to experience democratic values and principles in the countries hosting them.
The Iranian presidential election protests in 2009 reached Oslo.
Kjetil Ree/Wikimedia Commons
Election monitoring has become an international norm for maintaining electoral integrity. A new survey finds a world of difference between the high hopes and dire realities of poll-watching.
Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament’s London to Aldermaston march, 1958: an early example of mass political mobilisation to achieve a specific goal.
CND
Political campaigns today are presented as products of bottom-up participation, not top-down direction. But even if a campaign appears grassroots-driven, it’s likely to be run from the centre.
The Statue of Liberty stands as a beacon of the civil religion that is the contemporary faith in human rights.
Pixabay.com
The tradition of republicanism offered us civil religion, a foundation of belief that could counter any politics or policy that demands sacrifice in this world to be compensated in some “beyond”.
The first two stops in the travelling show called the Next American President did not lack entertainment. There were four different winners and plenty to talk about: some of the candidates cried foul…
Trump’s performances never fail to make breaking news, securing him the public’s attention.
World News Today/youtube
Donald Trump has applied the lessons of winning a TV audience to politics. Much as we might deplore the theatre of entertaining voters, we can’t wish it away.
Welcome to the 2016 Iowa Caucus.
DonkeyHotey/flickr
This article is part of the Democracy Futures series, a joint global initiative with the Sydney Democracy Network. The project aims to stimulate fresh thinking about the many challenges facing democracies…
Bonobos can inspire us to make our democracies more peaceful.
Wikipedia
We can draw inspiration from the successes of non-humans, learn from their group decision-making and gain insights from analogies. And with every extinction of a species we lose such possibilities.
We know about the human democracy that was. We know the failings of the democracy that is. But the democracy to come is both uncertain and full of possibilities.
Mitchell Nolte (2015), used with permission
Democracy must evolve in response to the threats we pose to the environment and to ourselves. We can learn from how other species make collective decisions, solve problems and survive.
Non-human Democracy (2015) by Sandra Eterovic.
Used with permission.
Despite the popularity in other disciplines of inter-species thinking, it’s ignored in democracy research. Why is that? Why can we not conceive of democracy as anything other than uniquely human?
What kind of society do our so-called “Western and networked democracies” count as normal if humans are constantly objectified, monitored and profiled?
Roch Marc Kabore addresses supporters after winning Burkina Faso’s presidential elections.
Reuters/Joe Penney
Voting for national leaders has become the global norm in a remarkably short time – in Africa in 1988, only 25% of countries had multiparty elections, but 94% do today. Yet all is not well.
Riot police prepare to move in on a protest against terrorism and espionage charges laid against two journalists who reported on Turkish weapon deliveries to Syria.
EPA/Tolga Bozoglu
Firmly back in control after winning snap elections, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his AKP government are reducing democratic process to a rubber stamp for their undemocratic project.
When our political institutions are market-driven, they risk becoming a democratic shell that no longer serves the people, as the European Union experience is showing.
Theophilos Papadopoulos/flickr
Democracy’s problem is not the crisis but the triumph of capitalism. Democracy has become market-conforming, resulting in whole sections of society lacking meaningful representation.
Did the Roman arenas of political conflict support the common good?
Trey Ratcliff/flickr
History offers countless examples of social change that is now consolidated and popularly supported, but which was only achieved through protests that were judged at the time to be extreme.
Modern video technology can make matters public, but accountability still depends on political processes to produce just outcomes.
YouTube/screenshot
Mobile video technology means outrageous behaviour and abuses can rapidly become public knowledge, but achieving just outcomes still depends on a political willingness to act on such knowledge.
Bridging the digital divide in many developing countries is not simply about access to ICT.
flickr/Matt Wilson
The recall is an ancient electoral procedure that has gained support in recent decades as a means for voters to defend the democratic state against extremism and serious abuses of power.
Iran’s nuclear deal promises an era of economic and, by extension, political collaboration with the West.
Reuters/Umit Bektas
Professor of Comparative Political Science and Democracy Research at the Humboldt University Berlin; Associate of the Sydney Democracy Network, University of Sydney; Director of Research Unit Democracy: Structures, Performance, Challenges, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.